Fish Or Coral First?

[danb_1985]

which is best to add first to a tank or does it not matter?

im thinking of adding corals after my cuc before fish as i dont have to scare the fish when placing or moving rocks? is there any advantage to either way?

 

[Alex Brown]

go for an easy to care for leather coral

 

[danb_1985]

could do but i was thinking adding all my corals before any fish? is there an advantage?

 

[ben1987]

no not really any advantage. I would probably go fish first actually and let the tank stable out a bit over a couple of weeks then try a coral.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Yeah as ben said adding your fish first means that it has chance to adjust to the bio load (so any small spikes in any of the water stats will not have such an impact) and will give you a more stable system to add your more sensitive corals into.

That being said though in all my tanks I have added fish and corals at the same time in no particular order which I think most people end up doing.

 

[1entra]

I would also suggest going a fish or 2 first and let the tank run a few weeks in order to get nitrates and phosphates under control before adding coral, that way corals are going into a stable(ish) system rather than in a new one (coz otherwise as soon as you start adding fish then you up the nitrates and this can sometimes upset some corals) . then you can carry on with adding corals and fish as you go along as long as you get yourself a decent maintainance program going, you shouldnt have a problem...

hope that makes sense

 

[VictorMeldrew]

I added a couple of fish first and then started adding a few corals and then just carried on that way, a fish or a coral it did not really matter after that, I found what i added depended on what was in stock in the shops i go to, if i do not see a nice fish i want, which is quite often then I will buy a coral.